Ceinwenn Posted December 30, 2008 Share Posted December 30, 2008 Mine doesn't have a set list of books, only a set list of countries. I'm choosing my books 1-2 countries in advance. At the moment I'm reading a book by an Algerian author & I have yet to choose the book for my next country (Andorra). The thing for me is that I really didn't want a challenge with a time limit & if it take me more than a year or 2 to do this one, then that's fine with me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Janet Posted December 30, 2008 Share Posted December 30, 2008 Kay, perhaps the 'Reading Through the Decades' Challenge might suit you? You pick a book from the 1900s, 1910s, 1920s etc but it's entirely up to you which you read. I'm doing that challenge - slowly! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phoenix Posted December 30, 2008 Share Posted December 30, 2008 Similar to reading through the decades is the 'nobel price' challenge. I'm doing this and as I am trying to get most of the books second hand, I never know what comes next - though it will therefore take some time until I'm done with this challenge. My plan is to read at least one book / several poems of each laureate but I sometimes like them and so I read more than only one book. But I do really like this challenge because the books are quite different and so it doesn't get boring. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Echo Posted December 30, 2008 Share Posted December 30, 2008 I like the sound of a lot of the challenges suggested so far! This may be my last year in college (fingers crossed!), so I will probably have a ton of reading to do all year, so I'm going to have to try a challenge that is a little easier to do. I quite like the idea of the decades challenge, so I think I'll start there in January or February. Any suggestions for books published from 1900 to 1909? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phoenix Posted December 31, 2008 Share Posted December 31, 2008 Any suggestions for books published from 1900 to 1909? In 1901 one of the greatest German novels was published: Buddenbrooks - The Decline of a Family by Thomas Mann. In 1929, Thomas Mann got the nobel price of literature for the Buddenbrooks. I absolutely love this book because it's so authentic and the characters are brilliantly characterised. Also, one gets a good idea about the life of merchants and citizens of the late 19th century. Many of the characters are said to have citizens of Luebeck, Thomas Mann's home town as a model and most of the people who thought to have found themselves discribed in this novel (although no one has really been mentioned by name) didn't really like it because they weren't described that positively. When Buddenbrooks was sold in Luebeck short after it was published for the first time, there were lists of names handed around on which people could see which character was supposed to be which person in real life. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lexiepiper Posted December 31, 2008 Author Share Posted December 31, 2008 The read all the countries one does sound very intriguing, I might give that one a go! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kay_loves_purple Posted December 31, 2008 Share Posted December 31, 2008 The "Reading through the decades" one sounds great, and the Nobel prize one too. I just might think of starting up on one of them (or both) one of these days Phoenix, what Nobel prize books would you recommend? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ernie Posted January 1, 2009 Share Posted January 1, 2009 Just out of curiousity, how do you go about finding authors from different countries? Try this: http://www.librarything.com/language.php?l=spa&alllanguages=1 click on any language on the left and it brings up a list with the most popular reads at the top of the page. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lexiepiper Posted January 1, 2009 Author Share Posted January 1, 2009 Try this: http://www.librarything.com/language.php?l=spa&alllanguages=1 click on any language on the left and it brings up a list with the most popular reads at the top of the page. Oh ty! That's great! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nollaig Posted January 1, 2009 Share Posted January 1, 2009 The read all the countries one does sound very intriguing, I might give that one a go! Is that the one Ceinweinn is doing, reading a book by an author from each of the nearly 200 countries in the world? I want to do that too! A real challenge would be to read 600 different books between us, (3 books per country, 1 each) rather than the same 200 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lexiepiper Posted January 1, 2009 Author Share Posted January 1, 2009 Is that the one Ceinweinn is doing, reading a book by an author from each of the nearly 200 countries in the world? I want to do that too! A real challenge would be to read 600 different books between us, (3 books per country, 1 each) rather than the same 200 Yeah that's not a bad idea! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nollaig Posted January 1, 2009 Share Posted January 1, 2009 It would take foreverrrrrrrr =P Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lexiepiper Posted January 1, 2009 Author Share Posted January 1, 2009 Well in some of the bigger countries that translate lots into english, it wouldn't be too hard to find 3 seperate books to read, but in the smaller ones we may have to read the same ones, but some countries rarely print into english lol Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ernie Posted January 1, 2009 Share Posted January 1, 2009 It would be good to come up with a list though, 3 from each country, one from some countries. There must be some that are obvious choices/ must reads. This would make a great new thread on its own. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nollaig Posted January 1, 2009 Share Posted January 1, 2009 Thats true.... well we could always help each other find books from countries and if theres a selection, try to pick ones of different genre or something to cover a variety. Then when there is only one book for all of us, at least there will be three perspectives you know? I'm definately going to give the challenge a go one way or another, I'll integrate it with my A-Z challenge. I'll check what countries I have with those and then add on new books for the other countries. This is way too complex for something so simple as reading. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lexiepiper Posted January 1, 2009 Author Share Posted January 1, 2009 Just randomly, I'm assuming is has to be the country the author was born in? Rather than the language it's released in etc? As I have an author that was born in Peru, has Chilean parents and describes herself as Chilean and publishes in spanish? So I think that would count for Peru? But I agree, we should start a thread and we can add books from each country, it could be a great resource if looking to read something new Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nollaig Posted January 1, 2009 Share Posted January 1, 2009 I would have thought it would be the author's nationality - whatever they consider themselves to be, although I suppose we could include both? And theres a list of authors by country on wikipedia, it probably wouldn't take long to pick our books out. Buying and reading is another matter entirely Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lexiepiper Posted January 1, 2009 Author Share Posted January 1, 2009 I think I'm going to do it by the country they were born in, makes it a little easier for me But yeah I agree, buying them will be the hardest part but I'm going through my tbr pile, if I can fill some in with books I've already bought then it's going to be a little cheaper! lol Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nollaig Posted January 1, 2009 Share Posted January 1, 2009 Exactly. I'm going to get Ceinweinn's list of countries and start working on accumulating titles now. How should we go about making a thread? The thread should at least contain the list of countries, and mark them off as books are suggested for them. And then in posts I guess people could pick a country, check it out, pick a few books and post them as suggestions maybe? It'll get very confusing if people start joining in at random times though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lexiepiper Posted January 1, 2009 Author Share Posted January 1, 2009 How about like this: 1. Afghanistan - A Thousand Splendid Suns - Khaled Hosseini, next book etc etc 2. Albania - Chronical in Stone - Ismail Kadare, next book etc etc 3. Algeria - The Attack - Yasmina Khadra, next book etc etc So just a list after the bolded country? Then people can leave a comment saying, which book and country and it can easily be added in, although for countries such as US, UK, Ireland etc in which there are thousands of choices maybe just put like 5 or something and people can search them out themselves if they want something else Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nollaig Posted January 1, 2009 Share Posted January 1, 2009 Yeah that sounds like a good idea - 5 is a good limit even if people end up reading the same books. As it is theres only 3 or 4 of us going doing this. I have no idea how Ceinweinn found these books though haha, I'm having no such luck! Do you want to make the thread or shall I? I don't mind. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lexiepiper Posted January 1, 2009 Author Share Posted January 1, 2009 Well you can make the thread if you want and i'll just help you fill it in as much as we can and then we can just add any contributions the others have, and as for finding them, all i've done so far is go through my tbr pile, google/wiki the authors to see their country of birth and then for the foreign ones Ernie suggested this which is fantastic, if you google/wiki the authors again then you can see their countries Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nollaig Posted January 1, 2009 Share Posted January 1, 2009 Done! Tell me if you think it needs any editing! And that site for foreign books is great, Ernie, if you're about the place! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lexiepiper Posted January 1, 2009 Author Share Posted January 1, 2009 That looks great Roxi I've left a list of some books, and will still look for a while but wont bother posting again until I have a decent amount, which will probs be tomorrow night Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ceinwenn Posted January 1, 2009 Share Posted January 1, 2009 I just stumbled across this again, lol. You ladies have been busy! There's also, as I mentioned earlier in this thread, a group on librarything that is solely dedicated to people doing global reading. I have found some great ideas for future books on there! Have a look: http://www.librarything.com/groups/readinggloballyficti#forums Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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